The Masked City

The whole place had the quality of what Irene could only describe as deadness - the sort of deadness that had never been alive. Even where timber or rope was used amid the cold granite and marble, it had a fossilized, unyielding appearance rather than showing any signs of organic life. The enclosed lakes of water that they passed were clear and dark. Nothing swam in them, nothing moved and nothing disturbed the water. Nothing lived in that water.

She had no background in archaeology or architecture to make sense of the stonework. A few times Vale had pointed at a lion statue, or at the curve of an arch, and muttered something about ‘Babylonian influence’ or ‘characteristic Saxon work’, but she hadn’t been able to do more than nod. She wasn’t even sure that categorizing the buildings would indicate any real history to this place. That would imply that real people had lived here, once upon a time.

There were no helpful footprints on the road either, and no dirt or dust marks - there wasn’t even any dust. Vale had muttered about that as well, before relegating it to ‘the general impossibility of the place’.

The only good thing was that the ache in her Library brand, triggered by Venice’s high-chaos environment, had subsided. It had reached the point where Irene had almost stopped noticing its presence, but she did notice its absence. It made a degree of sense. If this place was a prison for Fae, then it should weaken them rather than empower them.

They were passing underneath a high bastion when they heard the first sound. It was a deep, penetrating whisper from the other side of the bastion wall. It echoed amongst the stones and set off an answering ripple from the still canal beside them. It was almost … almost comprehensible, in a way that made Irene want to stop and listen, to try and make out what was being said.

She turned, and saw the same urge in Vale’s eyes.

She grasped his arm and pulled him on, away from the ebbing whisper, until only their footsteps broke the silence once more. The whisper still tempted her to look back and linger, as if she’d forgotten something important, something that she should really go back and see to.

But the pendant still led them forward. They travelled up a vast flight of stairs, over another soaring bridge, then through a sequence of angled flights of stairs, which always went to the left, but somehow didn’t result in them doubling back on themselves. As far as she could tell, anyway.

Then a scream broke the silence. It came from a vast metal sphere - no, a spherical metal cage - which dangled over empty space. It hung from a set of cables and chains that rose to a ceiling almost out of sight above them. The noise was shocking and sudden, like an owl’s screech in the middle of a peaceful night. It was also just as inhuman, just as animal. Whatever was in that cage, Irene did not want it to get out.

She had considered the other inhabitants earlier as potential allies. She had wondered if she and Vale could liberate some, and escape with Kai in the confusion. But the more she experienced the prison’s fundamental vastness and coldness, the less she liked the idea. This sort of prison argued for a very dangerous sort of prisoner. Ones who were so strange and insane that they even scared other Fae. So letting them out might be the sort of really bad idea that finished with a scream and a crunch.

‘How much further do you think it will be, Winters?’ Vale asked.

‘I’ve no idea,’ Irene said, shrugging. ‘I could argue that Kai wouldn’t be too far from the entrance, simply on the grounds of convenience. But they might have some form of transportation that is faster than walking.’

Vale nodded. ‘I had hoped at least to find tracks,’ he said again, gesturing at the pristine stone paving in front of them.

‘I think the situation may not be quite as bad as we thought,’ she insisted.

‘In what way?’ Vale asked.

‘Some of the Fae may want a war.’ She thought over the last couple of days. ‘But Lord Guantes isn’t being treated as a particularly honoured guest here. He needed his own minions to provide security at the opera. He was being watched by the Ten’s secret police, too. It sounds as if the Ten are giving him only the minimum level of cooperation.’

‘But why would the Ten cooperate with the Guantes at all, if they’re not fully behind them?’ Vale said. ‘If they would rather rule their lands than expand their boundaries, that’s their prerogative, but why then meddle with bigger schemes?’

‘Because the Ten can’t not cooperate with the Guantes, if they seem to be making a major political move,’ Irene said. ‘It’d be like, oh …’ She tried to remember the political complexities of Vale’s world. ‘As if someone had pulled in a major French spy in the middle of London and announced it to all the papers. The government would have to handle the matter sternly, even if they’d rather just brush it under the carpet and send the spy back to France, or even trade him for one of their own. The Guantes’ power play has made it impossible for the Ten here to be neutral, or they’d risk losing face and power. And if the Guantes succeed … Then the Ten will certainly gain from a war, along with all the other Fae. But if the Guantes fail and embarrass themselves, the Ten will want to disassociate themselves from the Guantes, along with everyone else.’

‘Plausible,’ Vale said. ‘But we’re trying to breach the Ten’s private prison here, Winters. If we succeed, they’ll have every reason to want us as dead as the Guantes do, if not more so. We’re striking directly at their power base, even if we blame the Guantes for it—’